Alexandria, VA (USA)

Wanted an early start today, so woke up at 0630L. Raul and I ended up getting a head start on the next unit's inspection (the rest of crowd was moving like tree sap...). Made good progress in the first few hours but had to go back to the previous unit for their debrief. Of course, it ran long... Finally got back to "second" unit for their "kick-off" and found I was "in charge" (introduced the group before Boss arrived). Everything turned out OK and the rest of our Team was happy not to be delayed further... After making sure Raul was doing alright with his first inspection, I used the free time to call the company in Patuxent River I've been talking to about conducting an interview (tomorrow). Also visited Cori and friends next door (missed Bobby again!). Met up with an old friend, Eddie, and picked his brain about Patuxent River. Met up with Raul and Dave for lunch at Jiffy's (can't get enough good gyros!). Helped Raul after lunch and made sure he was still on track for finishing on time. At our regular debrief, Mike not ready to depart (again!), so I drove back with Randy (again) and then began looking for transportation. Managed to find a car (had to go with them to the exchange first to be able to get it). Later, found Raul and we drove over to Alexandria for dinner (did I mention this was his first trip to the DC area?). We found a convenient parking lot and then walked over to King Street to explore - lots of good choices and atmosphere. Dinner at Las Tapas (Spanish cuisine - with flamenco dancers!). After a good meal, we walked around some more and got hitched up (for a short time) with an Old Town tour guide - he was telling kids about the history of the row houses... Found our car and then I drove Raul into DC to see the city by night - everything was lit up nicely and he was impressed. It turned out to be difficult to get out of the city (traffic and construction). Actually had to use our GPS, but it took us down Pennsylvania Avenue and MD-4 - kind of scary, actually... Of course, we made it home in one piece (2230L). Decided to go to bed early for a change...